Francine Raveney, founder, former director and Head of Research for EWA (European Women's Audiovisual Network), Key-note speaker

10.15 h to 11.15 h

Women in audiovisual production and creative responsibility in projects. Challenge and realities, beyond the glass ceiling.

This panel will discuss about women presence in creative positions in audiovisual industry. Last years' studies have shown the low presence of women in roles as direction, executive production and scriptwriting of audiovisual projects. Despite the fact that this numbers have gradually improved, we still find that women end up directing less projects than men throughout their careers, and tend to be more plentiful in low cost productions (but are also a minority in this sector). However, there are signs of optimism in numbers and big talents which bestow prestige on creative women in such diverse genres as fantastic, experimental, art house or documentary. This panel will approach this matters and multicausality of the low female presence in production, and also its consequences.

Carla Sospedra, producer for Miss Wasabi Films (production company for Isabel Coixet) and director of music videos.

Moderates: Núria Araüna

11.15 h – 11.45 h Coffee Break

11.45 a 12.45 h

Representation of feminity and women in contemporary audiovisual. Diversity and change?

The famous Bechdel test, which stablishes a series of guidelines to determine if a film is capable of going beyond male gaze and giving entity to female characters, confirms still that most of contemporary productions have deficiencies in equality matters. Lots of actresses have complaint about their roles being flatter or less talkative than the male ones, about the lack of old women representations or the difficulty to fit in products which only highlight bodies which are strictly subject to contemporary cosmetic beauty ideals. Others complain about feminism asking female characters to be strong or having positive attributes, which not always leads to plurality. The strengthening of productions for prestigious women, the influx of postfeminism and pop feminism and women's work in the industry… have changed this situation? In REC we have proposals which have attemped to transgress gender representations, and in this panel we analyze how a female director and an actress face representation of women in their job.

Criticism and programming as activities as mediating activities of visibility and legitimation of women's works and voices in audiovisual. Pending matters.

In the same way as women tend to take care of low-budget projects, it's also true that in programming of cultural events there is even a lower presence of women's works, and also of their voices in panels or media representations, except for the events or sections expressly dedicated to unequality or gender. It's true that programming and specialized criticism sectors are mainly occupied by men, who also tend to hold management positions. Keeping in mind that festivals and specialized media are crucial to the visibility and prestige of audiovisual works, which are the consequences of this structure for women's cinema? Which measures should be taken to reach equality? How much responsibility have men in equality and visibilization of women's work?

Participants:

Valeska Neu, sales agent and distributor for Films Boutique

Mira Staleva, programmer and deputy director for Sofia IFF and head of coproduction market in the same festival.